The Girl knew how to Chop and Change
by klebekaholic
Summary: Series of one shots following Hayley Marshall's journey from the moment she was disowned at thirteen for triggering the werewolf curse.
1. The first night

A/N So this is the first one shot in a little series I have planned out that will follow Hayley from this point (having just been thrown out after turning in her parents living room) up until she meets Tyler Lockwood in the Appalachian mountains. I'm not a very experienced writer since I've only written fic a few times, and Hayley is a character I've only written once before this so please be gentle :') and constructive criticism and general thoughts are appreciated in the reviews section, I'm always looking to improve, and if anyone has any head canons about anything that may have occurred during the years Hayley wandered from pack to pack I'd be more than willing to try and incorporate it into my story if you share it with me :)

Her eyes were damp. Again. But Hayley refused to let the tears flow. The time for crying was long gone. People who hoped to survive in this world didn't cry. They put on a hard face, stuck their middle finger up told the world to go fuck itself. And that was exactly what Hayley Marshall planned to do. She would not let the world see her cry. She wiped at her eyes and closed them, curling further into herself and shivering as the wind blew against her tent and the cold bit into her toes through the sleeping bag. Hayley the child would have sobbed her heart out at everything that had happened in the past few weeks. But Hayley was no longer a child. She was _not_ an abandoned little girl. She was a woman. A she wolf. And as much as the thought of it terrified her, it also gave her a strange sense of empowerment. She would no longer pore over fashion magazines and take the quizzes on who would be her future husband and spend hours a day waiting by the landline for her friends to ring so they could gossip. There would be no more days spent in the mall boy watching over latte's. There would be no more sleepovers at Angela's house where they stayed awake till the sun rose talking about everything and nothing. There would be none of that now. But she didn't need it any more. She didn't need gossip or a husband to come rescue her. She could do damn fine on her own. She'd been away from home for only twelve hours. She knew that. But she was still alive. And she intended to be for far far longer.

Her final fuck you to her parents would be surviving, surviving against what they'd hoped. Because Hayley knew exactly what they hoped. Mr and Mrs Marshall wanted Hayley to go missing and her body to be found a few months later so they could bury their daughter and forget she ever existed after that. (If they truly wanted their daughter to live then they wouldn't have put her on the streets, they'd have put her in care.) Forget the monster they brought into their homes as a baby. They'd bury her and try to pass her off as the sweet little girl who just went down the wrong path after becoming 'troubled' and could not be saved. No. Hayley would not bow. They would not find her body because she would still be using it in decades to come. She would not curl up and die like they wanted. She would not be stupid and get herself killed on the streets. She would _survive_. And when the time came, she'd stand over their graves and tell them exactly that. She'd _survived_.

Her parents, for lack of a better word (because you can't sincerely call two people that booted you out of their house for something you couldn't control your _parents_ ) at least had the _kindness_ (in their minds anyway) to let Hayley take her clothes and camping gear with her when they'd told her to kiss their asses and get the hell out of their house (not exactly in those words, but still, that's what they may as well have said, the meaning was the same). The gear just made Hayley feel nauseous. But if it was a choice between using it or sleeping rough on concrete on the streets and risk being harassed or mugged or worse, Hayley would choose the ratty sleeping bag and old tent any day. She had to start being grateful for the little things now.

The tent she'd set up in the forest a dozen miles from her home, the tent she was laying in right now, the sleeping bag she was curled up in at this very moment, were the same ones she slept in the night of the accident, the night everything had changed. Hayley and her parents had been camping up at the lake where they'd met up with his friends. Whilst the men drank their bourbon and were aggressively discussing football and the women tittered over wine, Hayley and Oscar had snuck out of their tents, swiped a couple of cans from the cooler and taken themselves down to the docks to get drunk unnoticed. They simply planned to get buzzed before heading back up to the tents to sleep it off. But one thing led to another, a speedboat was hijacked and the next thing Hayley remembered was opening her eyes and coughing up a gallon of water.

She'd been steering the boat when it hit the rocks and they'd been thrown overboard. Oscar had hit his head and had instantly been knocked out, and, unable to fight for even a minute to keep on the surface like Hayley apparently had (though she couldn't even remember getting on the boat, let alone steering it and crashing it), he'd drowned. And it was her fault. He was fifteen, and he always would be. Immortalised as the sweet young boy who'd been corrupted by the Marshall's wayward daughter. "Was she raised by wolves?!" one of the tittering mothers had commented as Hayley was lead into the back of a police car the next morning. Hayley snorted a little at the memory of that. Had she known then what she knew now, she'd have had the perfect opportunity for a witty retort.

Oscar's parents had been surprisingly forgiving. Hayley was always the first to mock the Christians she saw preaching forgiveness for all sins, but when she heard Oscar's mother tell her 'I forgive you' and she heard the sincerity in the woman's voice, Hayley had felt somewhat better about the entire situation. Hayley hadn't been charged with the boy's death. Alcohol was in both their systems and since Hayley couldn't remember driving the boat and Oscar wasn't around to claim responsibility for it or blame it on Hayley, they couldn't prove Hayley was responsible. The Marshall's were ordered to pay for the damage done to the boat, and that was that in the eyes of the law.

There was a bright side to all of this, Hayley thought for a few fleeting moments. No parents meant no chores, no bed to make or room to clear up or dishes to do. No alarm clock. No more school. She could finally do whatever she wanted all day. Though that thought soon turned sour. What she'd wanted to do all day instead of going to school was play video games and watch tv, take three bubble baths a day and paint her nails over and over… none of that would be happening now. Hayley wondered what the Marshall's were going to do with her room now she was gone. She wondered if they were going to report her missing and leave it a year or so before deciding it was time to move on with their lives and packing it all up. Hayley wondered if they'd adopt another child. Somehow she doubted that even if they wanted to risk getting another werewolf that the authorities would hand them over another kid when they'd already lost one after it'd turned into a killer in their care.

That hadn't hurt as much as she ever thought it would do. Finding out she was adopted. Maybe it was because deep down she'd always felt like the Marshall's weren't really her family. She felt a little bit like Harry Potter. The kid her family didn't want to be seen or heard, shoved away in a room and asked to stay silent when guests came round. She wouldn't lie and say she'd been physically neglected. They'd always provided her with three meals a day, a warm bed and a ride to school, but there was never any _bond._ There were photos of the three of them on holiday and Hayley could never remember feeling as happy as she looked in the photos. She could never remember smiling as she posed against her sandcastle that her father had sworn she'd built, though the sandcastle looked far too detailed for her three year old self. Another lie they'd told to her, she supposed.

She'd asked her parents about photographs before. Where were the scan photos taken throughout her mother's pregnancy? Why there were no photos around until Hayley was around seven months old? Other mothers had kept things like baby's first pair of shoes and baby's first Babygro, why hadn't her mother done that? Same goes for her baby book. Nothing noted about her first smile or giggle or laugh or the first time she sat up by herself. Her mom had simply said it'd all been lost when they'd moved house when Hayley was a baby. Now she knew that she'd been lied to, there were no scan photos because her mother was never pregnant with her, no details of Hayley's first smile because the Marshall's didn't know when that was. She wondered if she'd been celebrating her birthday on the right day all these years. Maybe June 6th was just a date they'd assigned to her based on an estimation of her age. Her birthday may be in late May. It made her feel so empty to not know the core of who she was. Not to know the people who'd created her. The woman who'd birthed her, the day she was born on. The time she entered the world.

Why was she given up? Were her birth parents too poor to raise her? Was her mother a teen herself when she had Hayley and decided going to college was more important than raising her child? Had she screamed too loudly? Thrown up too often? Been too fussy? Not slept enough? Had the novelty of a baby worn off quickly so they'd decided to just get rid of her? What was wrong with her? Did they know at birth the monster she'd become so they fobbed her off on someone else to deal with the beast instead? Did her birth mother ever love her? Or did she just sign the forms and leave the love to someone else, not caring that her baby girl would never receive it?

Thoughts continued to swirl around in Hayley's mind. Just forty eight hours ago she'd been shopping with her mother for back to school supplies. Then the full moon had risen and she'd transformed into a beast… and now she didn't have a home, her parents weren't really her parents. She didn't know what she was… _who_ she was. She didn't know where to go next. She knew she had to find more people like her… A pack. But other than that… she knew nothing. She couldn't finish school, she'd never graduate or go to college or get a decent job. She had no money, just the tent, sleeping bag and all the clothes she could carry in her backpack. She'd have to steal food in the morning if she didn't want to starve… She'd be turning into a criminal just to stay alive. Was this the rest of her life? Pitching up her tent in the woods every night and trying not to cry herself to sleep. _You made it through today._ She told herself. _You'll make it through tomorrow, and the next and the next. You'll find your people. A home, a pack, a family. You'll have it all. You made it through today. Just make it through tomorrow too._ It was a mantra, she repeated it over and over and over. Tomorrow will be better. Someone will find you, or you'll find someone. You won't feel so _alone_.

But for tonight. Hayley was alone. She was homeless, essentially orphaned, and so alone that there wasn't a single person in the world who _cared_ about her. The two people that were supposed to love her the most, unconditionally, who had _chosen_ to bring her up and raise her... hated her and didn't care if she lived or died alone in the forest. And with that thought breaking her mantra, the thirteen year old stopped wiping the tears from her eyes and let them fall. It took all the self-control she had not to sob out loud.

Before she closed her eyes to sleep, Hayley could swear she saw the shadow of a wolf pass by her tent and for a split second, she didn't feel so alone.

A/N: I'm English, so I have no idea how American law works (and if I'm being completely honest I don't really know all too much about English law either) Hayley never mentioned being prosecuted for the death she caused, and since it was an accident and she was intoxicated, I'm hoping it seems plausible that she'll have gotten away without a record.


	2. A Lone Wolf

A/N - Thank you to sicklyscribe for being my beta on this, as a Brit writing an American in America, I slip up sometimes haha ,I appreciate you helping me out!

I hope you all enjoy the next chapter! If you feel like it, let me know what you think either on here or at my tumblr, (hybridqueen) thank you!

* * *

Regret washed over Hayley in waves as she packed her new things into her new backpack (all of which were gifted to her, for she had almost nothing left of what she'd brought from her home when she was kicked out) in the fresh morning light and snuck out of the freshly painted blue trailer that had been her home for the past couple of months. She tiptoed around the doused out camp fire that was still smoking slightly and weaved around the other cars and trailers to move out of the pack's little home space, walking deeper and deeper into the woods. Everyone was sleeping. It had been a full moon last night **,** and the pack had only just returned to their homes to sleep off the change. Hayley had had no problem packing her things without waking anyone.

She'd written a letter to her foster parents before she left the trailer (for that's what they'd felt like) saying she was sorry, they'd done nothing but nice things for her and it wasn't their fault. But she just did not fit in. She did not belong. And she had to find somewhere else where she could feel at _home._ She just had to go. She was grateful, she truly, honestly was so so grateful. For everything. For the love, the support and compassion, for the roof, food, water, bed, clothes. For _everything_. She hoped they wouldn't hate her, and she hoped that one day she could come back and it'd be okay. I love you, thank you again for everything.

The letter? A lie. Or at least part of it was. She did want to come back at one point. She was grateful, so grateful. She did fit in. She had felt like she'd _belonged_. Until she'd been told she didn't.

The Mason's had been wonderful. Perfect. The parents she wished she'd been born to. No children of their own since they were only in their late twenties - when they'd come across Hayley in the woods, curled up in a dirty tattered sleeping bag and sobbing into her hands (it was the crying that had attracted them from nearby) they'd taken her in. Fed her, clothed her, and offered her the spare bed in their trailer. Penelope and Andrew ("But I insist you call me Penny and him Andy, we're friends sweetheart, no need for all the formal stuff") had been godsends. They took her in with no questions asked and treated her like a daughter. They'd answered so many of her own questions. She wondered what she'd ever done right in her life to have them sent to her, especially when she felt like she was being punished for her sins by being outcast in the first place.

When she first noticed them out of the corner of her blurry, tear-filled eyes, from inside the sleeping bag, Hayley mentally cursed herself for not being aware enough to hear them approaching. She tensed, muscles ready to spring her from the sleeping bag into a run.

"Relax, darlin'." The man soothed when he saw the teenage girl stiffen under the dirty blue fabric. His words carried a southern twang the Marshall's would have cringed at, but Hayley found it oddly comforting despite his huge frame, easily standing over six foot tall. "She's one of us." He murmured softly under his breath to the woman beside him.

"I can tell… so young…" The woman beside him was only a little shorter, had the same accent as her husband and was _stunning_. Hayley never quite recalled seeing a woman so beautiful. She had dark smooth skin like her husband, though her's almost seemed to glow under the light of the crescent moon. And where her husband had no hair at all on his head, the woman had masses upon masses of ringlets that bounced around as she leaned forward to offer Hayley a hand. "Come on sweetheart, looks like you have quite the story to tell." She said in the same soft tone the man had used.

Hayley warily took her hand and pulled herself up, causing the bracelets the woman was wearing to jingle and rattle against each other, before reaching down for the almost useless sleeping bag.

"Leave that honey, you won't be needin' it no more." The woman said as she wrapped the man's jacket around Hayley's shoulders, picked up Hayley's backpack and lead her a mile or so to a large gathering of cars and trailers. From huge jeeps, RV's and pick-up trucks to tiny little two **-** door cars. The trailers ranged from tiny little things Hayley couldn't believe people slept in to huge great things that could house five thousand. People were swarming around, busying themselves as they tidied around the area, only a few noticed Penny lead Hayley into the trailer she shared with her husband.

* * *

"What am I?" Hayley had tentatively asked Penny a few hours after she'd lead Hayley back to her trailer, just as she was plating up some piping hot pasta – Hayley's first proper meal in the two months since she'd left home. "Andy said I was like you… what am I? What are we?"

"A werewolf." Penny had responded without missing a beat. "But I'm guessing you already worked that out when you grew a tail and claws **,** sweetheart."

" _How_?" Hayley whispered, pulling the patchwork blanket Andy had given her further around her shoulders. She wasn't cold, she just desperately craved comfort. There was a lump in her throat at hearing the words. Of course she'd sussed out that's what she was. What else would you be when a full moon turned you into a monster **?** But hearing someone else speak the words out loud and confirm everything? That was worse than having it in your head and not quite knowing. Not quite being sure.

"It's passed down through genetics. The curse is in your genes. When you kill someone the curse is activated and the next full moon you turn into a wolf. Then by morning light you turn back. As you've already figured out."

Hayley looked down sheepishly, not wanting Penny to see the guilt etched into her face.

"We've all been there **,** honey. You don't have to tell me what happened, who you killed, how you did it. Why someone as young as you are ended up livin' all by herself in the middle of the woods. Your past is your past and if you wanna keep it to yourself then that's fine. It took me years to get the gall to tell everyone what I'd done." Penny assured as she passed Hayley a fork. "We're all the same here. We're a family, and you'll fit right in. You're safe now." She said before heading into the bedroom area, leaving Hayley to eat in peace.

Hayley slept peacefully for the first time in months that night. She was warm, clean, had a full belly. And despite being surrounded by strangers - by strangers that were all _murderers -_ She felt _safe_ _._ She didn't dread what the next day had to bring. Her stomach wasn't in knots at the thought of packing what little she had left and trudging round aimlessly until she found somewhere else to sleep that was relatively safe. She had a semblance of protection around her.

She'd been held that night, hugs from people that made her feel like for once the world was on her side. Her first hug in what felt like years, which may have actually been years. She'd been close to tears when Penny had shown her the bed all made up with fresh sheets and pillows, smelling like lavender. It was the care that had gone into the bed, as well as the actual bed itself that had made her well up, and at the first sign of tears Penny had pulled the teenager into her arms and held her close, Andy joining them in the hug a few seconds later.

"You got us now Hayley. We don't leave anyone behind, and we definitely wouldn't leave someone as special as you." Andy whispered gently as he kissed the top of her head before releasing them both and heading outside to join the gathering Hayley knew was going on.

Penny released her too and gently guided Hayley into the bed, tucking her in and kissing her cheek without a word, though she had a gentle smile on her face the entire time. "I'll just be outside if you need anything, sleep tight darlin'." she lilted before turning out the light and following her husband.

Hayley was asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

* * *

Over the coming months **,** Hayley slotted right into the pack's little community. The pack was huge, and people left and rejoined all the time. Hayley had no idea how big the pack might be if all those who considered themselves members were to rally round at the same time. Cars with trailers would pull up (though not always with trailers, sometimes the werewolves inside the cars just brought tents and preferred to sleep in those, and sometimes the people would even come on foot with huge backpacks) and the occupants would get out and greet everyone by name. Hayley stopped expecting people to be strangers to the pack after the first few weeks. Every member returning was another few nights around the campfire with food, usually a hearty stew or soup or the great chilli one of the women – Nadine – made, she was the best cook in the camp by far, as stories of adventures had across the country, sometimes across other countries in Europe and Asia and Africa for those wolves who managed to get the cash to do so.

Gifts and trinkets were passed around, new ingredients or spices to add to the gumbo. Later on, people would even bring things back for Hayley too, a bracelet or necklace, once even a shawl. Sometimes books in languages nobody could read were presented too, though they were pretty to flick through. The pack itself moved around constantly, state to state, though usually staying in the east of the USA. Hayley noticed that whenever people left to travel, it was never in groups of less than five. Once people grew used to the company and safety of a pack, it seemed it was hard to shake off.

There were people of all ages in the pack. And not all of them had triggered their curse. The oldest member was eighty two when Hayley joined, an elder. The youngest was little Abigail, just two months old. The adults that hadn't triggered their curse looked after the children on a full moon. Those that had took themselves off during the full moon to change. The pack usually did it together as a communal thing.

The first time she'd changed had terrified her, as had the other two times she'd changed since then. The first change with the pack was no different, and half way through she managed to crawl and find her own little secluded spot to change in, no longer able to take the screams and moans of pain from those around her accompanied by the endless cracks signalling the breaking of bones.

She learned that werewolves weren't the only supernatural thing that walked the earth. There were vampires descended from the Original ones turned a thousand years ago – created by witches that also existed both good and bad, and those who didn't align themselves either way. The wolves avoided both. Vampires were unnatural and were bloodthirsty creatures who could only roam at night due to the sun. Their strength and senses outmatches wolves, but when a werewolf was in their wolf form, they were almost attracted to vampires in the area as if the vampire were a beacon. In wolf form they could take down a vampire **,** and a werewolf bite would cause a horrendous death for any vampire bitten. Witches were deemed untrustworthy for the most part **.** Many in the pack had stories of being burned by witches, having paid them for spells that never worked (at least three members of the pack had gone to a witch in desperation and paid good money to have their curse lifted, only for the witch to run with the money) or for amulets and charms for protection that never worked either.

"We don't need no witches. We're a _pack_. We just need to stick together and we'll be fine. We've been fine this long." Andy explained to her once as they gathered wood together for the fire when Hayley had asked why wolves and witches didn't join forces.

She was by far the youngest 'triggered' (as they called it) werewolf in the pack - by five years. There were a few girls her age whom were more than happy to donate Hayley clothes until they could get near a city to buy her some more. They treated her like sisters. Eager to know what it was like to grow up rooted in a house, to go to an actual school. Her mundane home routine sounded so boring compared to the adventures of the others, who'd travelled all over the continent, who'd learned from home and went exploring rather than sitting at home watching television. Hayley almost felt like she was in some twisted teen movie when she realised they were just like normal girls and they ended up painting each other's nails and braiding hair by the camp fire as the pack shared stories. Hayley never thought she'd feel normal again. Never thought she'd have any more friends.

But there was also the things involved in pack life Hayley had hoped to ditch when she left home. Chores. School. Early mornings. Hayley had to help clean the trailer ever morning with Penny, and sort things out whenever the pack moved location. Sometimes after a full pack meal she'd be put on washing up duty with another of the kids and have to clean up fifty plates and pots and pans and the like. Yet it wasn't like it was at home. There was almost a community feel to it. "You're doing it to help the others out," rather than "You're doing it because I say so."

The kids of the pack (and despite Hayley's protests, that included her) had to keep up with their school studies, and so Hayley effectively became home **-** schooled, having to read up on the subjects she was given and complete workbooks and essays to be given in to one of the parents who'd trained as a teacher back in the day. Hayley did as told **,** albeit begrudgingly, if only because she didn't want to be seen as stupid as well as pathetic after having being abandoned by her real parents.

* * *

It was the fifth change Hayley had experienced with the pack. As always, when she woke naked in the woods, she scampered off to the remote location she'd put her clothes so she could dress in peace. She didn't want the others to see her naked, despite the fact that the rest of the pack seemed to embrace every part of being a wolf. They felt like family to her. But she still wasn't comfortable with what she was. Summer was finally upon them, and so the night before Hayley had picked out a strapless cami to wear for the day – a present from Penny for her fourteenth birthday the week before. A surprise party had been organised. A huge feast prepared. There was laughing and dancing and games, they'd all cupped their hands and howled at an almost full moon. Hayley cried that night for the first time in months as she was presented with gifts. Gifts that were made with love and affection, that were given to her because they _wanted_ to gift her, not because they had to through obligation or duty. She truly felt like she _finally belonged_.

Hayley sat down on the grass once she was dressed, feeling the fabric of her clothes in silence, almost in tears at the fact they were gifts from two amazing people who'd practically adopted her. Gifts from people who she hoped could love her as a daughter in time, who she loved.

"Hayley? Everything okay? You've been gone a little while" The alpha called out. Zachary, his name was. He was quiet, kept himself to himself most of the time. Hayley only ever really saw him when he called pack meetings to discuss new locations, during celebrations such as the party thrown for her birthday and during changes. His wife had died a few years ago and he'd been a recluse since then, having tried to step down as alpha numerous times apparently, though the pack knew if he resigned he'd wander off like an elephant and wait for death to take him too.

Hayley jumped, once again cursing herself for not paying attention to her surroundings. "Everything's fine." She hummed as she pulled her hair up into a bun, keeping it from getting matted more until she could shower and brush it off. Her hair gone was leaving her shoulders exposed to the gentle breeze, a reminder that summer wasn't completely here, not just yet.

"You need to leave. You need to leave _now, girl_." Zachary practically hissed at her, almost the instant her hair was put up. When Hayley got up and turned to face him, he reminded her of a wolf ready to attack, muscles tense, leaning forward's slightly, his upper lip pulled back in an almost snarl.

"I – "

"I know who you are. You think you could show _that mark_ around here and nobody would recognise it? What it proves you are?! Pack your things and leave. And don't you ever darken the doorways of anyone in my pack again." He said, eyes blazing with anger "And do not mention this to Andrew or Penelope. They are good people, who deserve more than the danger you put them in. But I won't hesitate to outcast them as well as you for the safety of this pack if you choose to drag them down with you. Don't test my warnings girl. Don't dare." as he turned and left. Despite his even tone, a recovery of the way he'd hissed at her earlier, Hayley recognised the threat. Her heart did too as it thumped heavily in her chest.

The mark he spoke of was the birthmark on her shoulder. She'd been told it was shaped like a crescent moon at times. Other people had said it looked like a banana. Hayley thought nothing of it most of the time. Her parents must have reported her missing, Hayley supposed. They'd reported her missing and the mark was a descriptor to look out for. Zachary had read what she'd done. Read that she'd killed someone in a stupid selfish reckless act and now he wanted her gone. (Nobody had ever asked Hayley what she'd done to trigger the curse. It was one of those unspoken rules on how to be courteous. Don't ask a lady her age, don't ask when the baby's due, don't ask if smashing someone's skull in or caving in someone's chest was the reason they transformed into a beast every full moon. But all those who shared their stories with her had killed in self-defence or the defence of another. Nobody had killed in anger or rage or stupidity.) He didn't want someone like her in his pack.

 **Plead with him.** Hayley's inner voice whispered. **Explain you didn't mean it. It's not all your fault. You can't just give this all up.** She was about to shout "Hey, wait!" but the words stuck in her throat.

She couldn't do that to Penny and Andy. Not after all they'd done for her. They loved the pack, the pack loved them. The pack was their family… She couldn't tear them away from that. And so Hayley waited a few minutes before returning to the trailer, saying good morning/good night. And retiring to bed with her family.

Ten minutes later the snores came. Penny snored, and Andy had learned to sleep deep enough to avoid it. So Hayley packed, wrote the letter and scarpered. The tough girl in her - the one who'd demanded she not cry on her first night of abandonment, screamed at Hayley not to look back. To not leave a note, to not be remorseful. That being too soft would be the end of her in this life. Hayley didn't listen to that voice. She looked back every couple of yards she walked, trembling as she thought of the possibility of her new family hating her for what she'd done. After a few miles, the thought was overwhelming and she couldn't breathe anymore, the ache in her chest pushing the air from her lungs.

Sitting down, Hayley let out a sob and pulled out her clothes, new pretty things, gifts. A rope bracelet woven specifically for her. An envelope with $50 in it that had been gathered from the rest of the pack to go out and buy something nice for herself. The birthday card with the best message inside it "With love, P&A xoxo". She could smell their scent on her things. And she was so, so close to gathering them all up and tossing them into the nearest dirty puddle. To tell herself she didn't need things, she didn't need pretty tops or bracelets or x's and o's on a birthday card.

It was a few minutes before Hayley gathered the composure to put everything back in her bag and carry on moving through the woods.

She didn't look back this time. She couldn't.

Hayley felt her heart breaking as she walked away. Breaking for Penny and Andy and how their good memories of her would be tainted by the fact she left. That they'd feel like they weren't enough for Hayley. She knew them, she knew they'd sit and think about how they could've been better when the truth was they couldn't have been any better to her at all. It was breaking for the family she finally thought she'd found, the sisters and the brothers and the best friends. Breaking because she was a murderous monster whom could never truly belong anywhere with anyone. Breaking because she had decades of solitude to come with nobody who would ever accept her fully, who would love her unconditionally, stand by her and want her around.

Hayley never looked back at a pack again. Never integrated herself like that again. She couldn't. She tried so hard to fit in, but she was always scared of it happening again. Falling in love with a pack to only be told she didn't belong to them any more.

She would always be a lone wolf.


End file.
